Hezbollah: Hiding Among Civilians?
Brian Doherty | July 28, 2006, 12:52pm
Salon has an interesting long piece by Mitch Prothero (you'll have to sit through an ad to see the whole thing) attempting to debunk the notion that Hezbollah's military troops are "hiding among civilians." While it will not be completely convincing to those not inclined to be convinced (or those who see no important distinction between "civilian" Hezbollah and "military" Hezbollah), here are some interesting excerpts:
My own reporting and that of other journalists reveals that in fact Hezbollah fighters--as opposed to the much more numerous Hezbollah political members, and the vastly more numerous Hezbollah sympathizers--avoid civilians....
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Although Israel targets apartments and offices because they are considered "Hezbollah" installations, the group has a clear policy of keeping its fighters away from civilians as much as possible. This is not for humanitarian reasons -- they did, after all, take over an apartment building against the protests of the landlord, knowing full well it would be bombed -- but for military ones.
"You can be a member of Hezbollah your entire life and never see a military wing fighter with a weapon," a Lebanese military intelligence official, now retired, once told me. "They do not come out with their masks off and never operate around people if they can avoid it. They're completely afraid of collaborators. They know this is what breaks the Palestinians -- no discipline and too much showing off."
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Hezbollah's political members say they have little or no access to the workings of the fighters. This seems to be largely true: While they obviously hear and know more than the outside world, the firewall is strong.
Israel, however, has chosen to treat the political members of Hezbollah as if they were fighters. And by targeting the civilian wing of the group, which supplies much of the humanitarian aid and social protection for the poorest people in the south, they are targeting civilians.
UPDATE: David Bernstein over at Volokh Conspiracy discusses how the Salon article, while trying to argue that Hezbollah does not have a policy of hiding among civilians, undercuts itself by reporting some specific examples of them doing exactly that.
William Woolsey | July 29, 2006, 9:23am | #
Perhaps some of the people posting here could read the article?
The reporter has visited Hezbollah territory many times. He tells a compelling story that the soldiers are extremely secretive.
It all has to do with maintaining security. Hezbollah doesn't trust all of its members and employees not to be spies for Israel.
By "political" Hezbollah, the reporter doesn't just mean the senior leadership
So, the vast majority of civilians in South Lebanon are "political" Hezbollah. They support Hezbollah, but they don't have weapons and they aren't used for fighting.
Then there are all these Hezbollah workers who are involved in providing social services to the supporters. Military matters are hidden from them as well.
Presumably, they "support" the military wing. But they don't do anything concrete.
Anyway, the article also suggests (and other sources suggest) that Hezbollah fighters hide things like launch sites and bunkers in places where they won't be seen by Israeli spies, and because they think there are Shia in south Lebanon who will sell them out to Isreal, they have to hide them from even "Hezbollah" civilians. And so, they are not located in places crowded with civilians.
It looks like they correctly determined that trucking rockets into the middle of a residential area of a town, where there are many eyes likely to see the location, will provide no protection from Israel. It will be bombed.
So, they don't put them in places like that. They put them in places where there are few eyes to see the location.
And what is the proof? Israel is bombing residential areas. And they aren't getting the missles to stop.
Israel is attacking town centers and the like. According to the reporter, they are blowing up things that aren't involved in the fighting.
Suppose U.S. submarines were being used to bomb Israel.
It would be like Israel bombing social security offices or post offices in the U.S. Or the office or home of local mayors.
They are all part of the U.S. government. There location is well known.
Again, read the article. Perhaps it is in error. But many of the comments here appear to be very ignorant.
I would note that senior Israeli forces have admitted that they are bombing north Lebanon just to punish the rest of the Lebanese for their toleration of Hezbollah. Supposedly, this will motivate them to defeat Hezbollah themselves.
While I haven't seen any relevant quotes, it is hard to imagine that they aren't bombing the civilian side of Hezbollah for the same reason. To convince the senior political leadership to disband the military side by destroying their assets used for civilian services.
Of course, this is all "terrorism," almost exactly like the bombing campaigns in WW2, both by the Germans and British. And of course, by the U.S. to a smaller degree. You know, destroy the enemies moral and make them give up fighting.
The problem, of couse, is that what really happens is the targeted population hates the enemy more when they are directly attacked.
